Pokemon Mystery Dungeon - Obscure Encounters outdated
by Torchic 2
Summary: This story is not being updated anymore. Check out the new one.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1 - Arrival**

Before me, blackness. Pure blackness.

The void I found myself in was dark.

Everything was... empty. I was alone.

I couldn't see my hands before my eyes. That is, if I could move them.

Moving was impossible for me.

All of my senses, gone, too. They had been removed from me.

I was petrified, like I was made out of cold, hard stone. I felt like a statue, standing somewhere, not aware of its surroundings.

Petrified? Of fear? No, that couldn't be it. The void surrounding me should have been scary for me, but I seemed to not feel the least bit frightened.

Maybe of coldness? No, that wasn't it either. I wasn't freezing; I'm sure I would have felt my body frozen if that would be the case.

It had to be something different. But what? I couldn't wrap my head around it.

It was very strange to not be able to move a single muscle, as if they were nonexistent. I wasn't even sure if my eyes were open or not.

 _Why can't I move?_

I asked myself this question; my own thoughts were still with me. Intact, to my fortune.

Except for my memories.

They were absent. Wiped out of my head. Null.

Something else came into my mind, ignoring the loss of memories.

 _Am I even breathing?_

If yes, I wouldn't know. If no, how was I alive then?

How long had I been here, anyway? Was it minutes? Hours? Days? I didn't know.

My perception of time had been, much like my senses, eliminated.

There I was, floating inside of the emptiness, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for anything to change.

For me it felt like months of hovering inside of nothing. Seeing nothing, hearing nothing, feeling nothing, smelling nothing, everything was just... nothing.

Wait, what was that?

Suddenly I could feel something.

Or more like someone.

But I wasn't sure what it was exactly.

It felt like... someone was there, right next to me.

Saying something.

Being scared.

Attempting to get my attention.

Shaking my body.

Not knowing what it should do.

It felt strange to know someone was right next to me, trying to communicate with me, only to return nothing. Not moving, not speaking, not even reacting the slightest to its actions of trying to grab my focus.

As if I were...

Dead.

A limp body, lying somewhere.

Devoid of life.

Withering.

 _Wait, am I... really dead?_

 _How? And when? And why?_

So many questions arose in my head right then, failing to come up with a plausible explanation for this predicament.

 _If I really died, is this the afterlife?_

 _Then why is it so empty?_

 _Why is there nothing?_

 _Is this my punishment for something, even?_

More questions entered my mind, me fully aware no one could answer them for me.

Meanwhile, the mysterious presence was still present; it was... doing something.

Suddenly, a jolt of pain rushed through my body, catching me off guard.

It hurt. A lot.

It felt like my body was hit by a lightning strike, directly hitting the front of my body.

For the next five seconds, I felt nothing but the immense pain soaring through me, trying to reach every last bit of my body.

It was like I was being tortured by something. I thought I would die again.

 _But can I die again? I am already dead, as it seems._

And as sudden as it came, it was gone.

I could feel my body again.

I could hear the voice again, breathing heavily, as if it used up all of her energy for something, and was now trying to regain some of it.

A voice belonging to a female.

Still terrified.

I could feel her shaking me again, saying something to me.

Slowly, I felt the rest of my senses returning to me.

I felt myself breathing again.

Breathing in the fresh air around me. Trying to calm me after the shock.

I heard the voice again; this time, clear as day.

"Come on, come on... There has to be something that'll work if that didn't!" she thought aloud, sounding like she was in a state of panic.

I tried to move my arms, my legs, anything, to not let her electrocute me again.

She seemed to notice me trying to budge. She gasped in surprise not long after my attempts.

"Oh my Arceus, it worked! It worked!"

I thought I heard her wrong. What did she say again?

It looked like my hearing was back; I could hear the wind whistling past me and the leaves of a nearby tree. But it seemed to still be a bit numb.

"Hey, are you alright?"

Ok. I heard that clearly. It was definitely coming from a female person.

It seemed like my hearing was now back again. For real this time.

I slowly opened my eyes and was greeted by a green and blurry image.

I instantly closed them shut again. It felt like my eyes were burning, so they were starting to wet.

The identity of my "rescuer" was still unknown to me; she blended in so well with her surroundings. It seemed like we were in a meadow, which had, for my taste, too tall grass. Next to me was a tree large enough for me not to see the leaves of it. I had the strangest feeling that I had shrunk, or everything had gotten five times bigger than normal.

"Oh, no... Don't cry now, you'll be fine."

Wow. She thought I was crying. How funny. Not.

Now, she assumed I was a crybaby.

I failed to reason with her, as my voice had still not recovered yet.

For now I had to explain it to her from my mind, not caring about the fact she couldn't hear them. Even if she basically revived me from the dead and I had to make it up for her.

 _I'm not crying!_

 _My eyes are burning! These are two completely different things._

"Oh, I have an idea."

She suddenly jumped over me and tried to lift me up, successfully.

I laid limp over what felt like her back, surprisingly, carrying me to wherever she wanted to bring me. My body still protested from moving; it seemed I still couldn't move without help.

I hoped that this wouldn't be permanent. I still couldn't feel everything, just my rescuer lifting me up came to my mind as something physical happening to me.

"I'll bring you with me to Muji Village."

 _Muji...?_ Ok, now I knew I was anywhere but my home. Never had I ever heard anything about a place called "Muji Village". And I knew she was worrying for me, but we had never met before. She had no reason to bring me with her; she didn't know me. At least, I didn't know her.

Oh yeah, memory loss. That's a thing that happened to me, for some reason.

At least she was helpful and didn't abandon me while I was "playing dead."

* * *

After a while, just laying on her back felt boring, so I tried to open my eyes again to at least look at the person who found me.

It took a bit to gain a sharp picture of everything around me, but eventually I realized something.

I could see far better than normally. I was sure I could've easily identified the text of a page from something small as a book from a hundred meters away. Which was strange, because I didn't know how good my vision had been before that incident. It could have been better or worse for all I knew. Weird.

The next things in my point of view were my hands. Well, the lack of those, actually.

Instead of what I used to see when I looked at my hands, was something else. At first I told myself that I was hallucinating from the shock earlier, but after blinking a few times and trying to move them, something was made clear to me.

Those weren't hands.

They were paws.

Blue ones, to be precise, with some sort of yellow band around the wrist of said body part. And these were mine. At the same time, my nerves registered the texture of the skin which I laid upon. The scaly body which I was on top of.

I was so shocked to realize these events after testing to see if my vision would still fool me, because my body literally flew off my carrier and landed on the gravel-like ground.

She noticed me falling off, but was too slow. She tried to catch me with her... two green tentacles... growing out of two green dots, the size of a pea, growing out all around her neck.

Before I could process what I had witnessed, I already crashed to the ground. Unfortunately, my landing wasn't as graceful as I would've liked; the center of my back fell directly on a mildly bigger and sharper stone in the gravel pavement, resulting in me yelping, more in surprise than in pain.

My back was pounding as it hit the hard ground, and I was aware that my nerves had been reactivated to full functionality. Ironically, I wouldn't have minded the numbness I had felt before, but at least my senses had fully returned to me at last.

Rolling to the side, I managed to open my eyes again, and finally saw my rescuer from the edge of my vision.

What I saw took my breath away.

The big, dark reddish eyes, the big leaf growing out of the top of its head, waving into the direction of the light breeze blowing around us. Its scales shining in the morning sun, its quadrupedal stand, and its single, wide claw on each foot told me enough. I didn't know what was going on here, but this **had** to be a dream. There wasn't any other explanation.

Standing before me was an animal which I had never seen before. A creature which had a giant leaf growing out of its head. Still having its two long, green tentacles outside.

Which had talked to me.

Which I could understand perfectly.

I still wasn't able to process everything that happened thus far, but these were without any doubt the most strange events I had witnessed in my life.

"Oh my gosh, are you alright?" the creature before me asked me with a shocked expression, making its way to me while apologizing. "I'm so sorry! I didn't notice you falling off..."

I ignored it, my only intention now to get out of here. I didn't know where I wanted to go, but the most important thing for me right now was to just get away from this monster before worse things happened.

Completely forgetting what she wanted to do with me, my fear took over after that, bringing me to my feet. My hind feet. That was what my instinct told me, to get on my feet and just flee.

To my misfortune I couldn't seem to get a good stand on them. Because of the whole thing of me being a quadrupedal creature now, apparently. I lost my balance and tumbled to the ground again.

"Hey, hey... what are you doing?"

It spoke again. I could hear it and understand it. This had to be some sort of dream. A lucid dream, yes, that had to be it. There was no other logical reason as to why I suddenly could understand animals.

But at the same time, everything looked so real to me; much too real to be just a dream. The clouds above, all having different designs and shapes as others, drifting through the sky. The occasional bird figure, one more different than the other, flying at the same level as them. The leaves and branches on the various trees all next to the pavement shaking with the wind, making the well known rustling noises. The blades of grass also next to the pavement, as well as the gravel which I laid upon right now, every single bit of these things looked way too realistic.

I was basically searching for something, anything, to make sure this was just my imagination taking over while I was at home, in my room, in my bed, peacefully sleeping.

Did... I even have a home?

"What's up with you...? Calm down, jeez." Now it started to look annoyed by my actions. I couldn't blame it. It was pretty stupid and really embarrassing to look at, I presumed. "It's not like I will eat you or something..."

Slowly but surely, my panic subsided and my rational thinking got a turn to make. I looked at its eyes. It was not happy, though it didn't appear angry. It was more on the line of a 'what the actual fuck are you doing?' stare.

I had to do something. Hopefully, my voice was back. After that yelp I gave from me, I should be able to talk again.

"... What are you?" I bluntly managed to say to the creature, hoping it could understand me. The result of having shrunk made my voice sound higher than I thought it should have been. The higher, but still belonging to a male, pitch of my voice made me jump back a little.

At that point it looked rather confused to say the least, not really expecting any of those sorts of questions.

"Did you hit your head after crashing to the ground?" it asked me. It raised one eyebrow and just looked at me funny.

"... No."

"Are you sure?"

"Look. I know what I did just then, ok? That was just my panic taking over me for a second. I couldn't really counter-react to that. I'm sorry for overreacting." I hoped apologizing to it would ease the tension between us.

"Ok, I know what my instincts tell me to do when I'm in a phase of fear and panic. But to get on my hind legs and make a run for it isn't one of-"

"Just stop mentioning it and answer my question already!" I started to stand up, taking care to get on all four of my feet simultaneously and not look like a complete idiot. My facial expression told it I wanted a real explanation to what was going on here.

It seemed to work, as the plant lizard sighed.

"Alright, to me it seems you got yourself a case of severe brain damage." It teased anyway, just trying to be funny and lighten the mood, obviously not working on me. "But I think you haven't seen one of my species yet, because we normally aren't common in this particular area of Ferom."

 _Ha. You and me both, apparently. Wait, Ferom?_

"But," she continued, ripping me out of my thoughts and holding one of her legs in front of her, "my name is Kori. I'm a Chikorita. You know, a Pokémon. Nice to meet you."

"Um…" almost immediately noticing the familiar way of greeting another, I naturally returned the gesture, setting my paw on top of hers - I didn't know any other way of doing said gesture, I had to think quickly - trying to recover from the horrible first impression I gave her. "Nice to meet you... too?" I quickly lost my balance again, but set my leg back on the ground just in time. "No, I have never heard of a Pokémon before. I mean where I came from, animals normally don't speak to each other; like this, I mean. They don't have-"

"Wait wait wait, hold on." She held her other paw up to kindly signalize I should stop talking and listen to her for a moment. "You're confusing me again. More than ever now. What do you mean by... never heard of Pokémon before?"

I didn't want to go full out on her too quickly, telling her I was some other creature, turned into one of theirs. But I couldn't find any other way of telling her why I was not familiar with what seemed like the most trivial thing in this world.

"I should have said this earlier, but I'm a human."

She started to open her mouth to respond to my illogical nonsense again, but I stopped her before she could say anything with the same gesture she did.

"Before you tell me that I'm not making any sense, I know that. But hear me out first," I told her, while she still had her mouth partially open, slowly closing it and putting her paw back on the ground again. "Yes, you heard me right. I really am a human. Well, I was one, as you can see. Now I'm some sort of blue feline creature talking to you. Like, we are doing a real conversation together, which I thought was impossible with animals back where I came from. You see, back where I was from, animals like you, no offense, couldn't talk. They just make these incomprehensible noises, but don't speak like we do right now. They don't have their own language to communicate with each other, for the most part.

"When they feel threatened, for example, they growl at their threat. They don't talk it out like we do. That's what fascinated me a couple minutes ago. Communication doesn't exist there. Only humans are able to communicate with each other, because we are able to understand one another, and could come up with various languages which we can use to speak."

It seemed like that explanation didn't seem to work on her, but at least the confused look on her face was gone.

"Also," I added, ignoring her stares, "sorry for asking this, but do you know what species I am? I... can't figure it out, hehe."

I looked at my body again, surprised I could turn my head almost 180 degrees to the left and to the right. While doing so, I noticed my fifth limb: a tail. At the end of it there was some sort of star-shaped appendage. I really was one of those Pokémon she mentioned before, wasn't I?

"So, you are saying you are a human turned Pokémon?" she asked me, ignoring my question and making my head turn back to her again. "That's a lot to take in at once. It's not everyday that you see someone saying that they were a human once. Especially when they don't exist anymore."

 _What, what? What did she mean by they don't exist anymore? Were they wiped out? And if that was true, how did that happen?_

"Can you elaborate on that, please? I don't think I understand..."

"Sorry, I don't know any more. Just that they are ancient beings that once roamed the world several millennia ago. The reason they are gone? Unknown. At least that's what I had been told." I guessed she shrugged her shoulders, because it looked a bit strange since she didn't really have shoulders like I used to have. "But enough of that, let's get going. I heard there is a village nearby, just a few miles from here. That's where I wanted to go before I found you."

I really had nowhere to go, so I just nodded and tried to make my way to walk next to her. It was strange to be mobile on four legs; it was a completely different method of walking than on two legs. It took me a bit to figure out how not to slander like an idiot, but it worked out in just a few minutes.

"Hey," I turned my head to the Chikorita while walking on the gravel path beneath me, "can you now tell me what exactly I am? You know, because I don't really know anything about Pokémon in general, so you have to be my guide for now."

"Of course." She inspected me a bit, walking around me while I made sure I stopped, so I wouldn't interrupt her. "Looks like you're a Shinx."

"Shinx, you say?"

"Yeah, a Shinx," came the answer from her. After a bit, she added, "Do you have a name? I don't want to call you by your species' name. Nobody does that nowadays."

Yeah, my name. That was easy. I should be able to say that. No problem.

Telling her… my name.

Well, crap.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 – Explanations**

"What do you mean, you don't know?" Kori asked me, facing me with her expression of confusion again.

We were still in some sort of pre-forest area, the morning sun trying to shine through the various trees surrounding us, still on our way to Muji Village. Nothing has changed since I told her about me not remembering my own name. The Chikorita was dumbfounded by that answer, but I explained to her I couldn't remember anything at all from before I was found underneath that tree where she had discovered me. I informed her that I was in some sort of void, my body numb and thought I died somewhere even, of some unknown reason. For me it felt like I wasn't alive anymore, I had no other plausible explanation for it at the time.

What I didn't mention was the extreme pain I felt right before waking up, it was like I was hit by a bolt of lightning, and she shouldn't normally control electricity. That is, if some, or any kind of species would've been able to wield that power. _Wait, why am I thinking about this? Nothing can control the weather, let alone lightning storms._

"I see," Kori's head turned back where she was able to see where we were going. I did the same, I didn't want to fall again for the hundredth time. Kori thought for a bit, and had an idea. "Do you mind if I think of a name for you? Until you can remember your true name, that is."

"I don't see why you shouldn't. Sure, go ahead, I'm open for suggestions."

While Kori was thinking of a name for me, I was in my own thoughts, processing what had happened until now.

 _So... this is where I am now? In an unknown world, in which I am one of those strange and mysterious beings known as Pokémon; where one of those is luckily my guide, helping me find at least some answers to my sudden appearance on this earth. If it is called earth. I'm almost a hundred and one percent sure that we are not the only species of Pokémon. And, how many are there? If I would have a good guess I would say... umm... I dunno, maybe 200? Oh, wait. Are there aquatic Pokémon, too?_

 _But- why me, exactly? Why choose me, in particular? Literally anyone would've been better suited than I will ever be. I mean, why not choose somebody already existing in this world to solve their problems, and not 'kidnap' someone from an entirely different world, if not universe? That would be much more convenient. But no, for some particular reason I was chosen to eliminate that major issue they can't fix for themselves. And my amnesia isn't helping, either. I'm kinda lucky, to be honest, having Kori taking me with her to wherever she's heading. I don't know what I would've done if she hadn't crossed paths with me... maybe I still would have laid back there while-_

"Xunie." She said, interrupting my train of thoughts.

"Xunie?" I repeated while looking at her, raising one eyebrow.

"Yeah, Xunie. That'll be your name until we find out otherwise."

"Xunie..." I tried to understand what that name meant, or where it came from, because I noticed that Kori is a part of her species's name, Chi-kori-ta. But failing to do so, I also realized that name wasn't exactly the perfect name for a boy. "Isn't that a bit... um... girly?"

"What do you mean? You said you were open for names. No one would care if a name sounds girly or not. You could have a name like Shiny and nobody would even look at you funny, even if they'd know you're a boy. It's perfect for you."

"How are you so certain it's perfect for me?"

"Trust me, I just know." She smirked at me, winking with one eye.

 _I'm not so sure about that, I have a feeling you don't know any better names to give me._

"I hear no objections, so from now on your name shall be Xunie." She turned her head to look at me, confirming her decision with a smile on her face. She seemed like she knew that this name meant more than it sounded.

"Fine... call me that, then." Defeated, I rolled my eyes, still not sure if I should've trusted her with the whole name thing.

Continuing our way, I took the time to properly analyze my new body. For starters, I hadn't noticed I had much sharper teeth in my mouth now, the front row of them clearly existing for tearing apart meat and hard food. Wondering why I didn't cut my longer tongue on them yet, I also noticed two yellow stripes on the lower part of my two front legs. I questioned myself why they were a different color than the rest of my front body, or why they were on my legs in the first place. The stripes seem to just be decoration.

Speaking (or thinking) of different color, from the second half of my torso, my fur color drastically changed from an almost sky blue to a simple black, as if the color was, like a light, turned off. The black fur reached every bit of my second half of my body until the tip of my, uh, tail. On it was something yellow and star shaped, seemingly just there to exist with no real purpose, like the stripes. My neck fur, if I focused on a particular angle with my head and my eyes, had the shape of a tight scarf, also the same black as the rest of my torso. I also realized my ears were almost as big as my face, with some yellow fur inside of them.

 _It's strange how half of my body doesn't seem to have any color at all. Is there a reason for it? And what's up with that miniature star shaped object on my tail? …I still can't believe myself having some sort of tail_ _ _…_ wow. Anyway, maybe I should ask Kori if she knows anything about my species. ___…_ Shinx was it, right?_

"Hey, do you know-" I wanted to ask Kori some details about it, but I quickly noticed she stopped in her tracks a few meters behind me after I've turned my head to the spot she normally would have been. "Why did you stop? Is everything alright?"

It was then that I noticed; something was not alright. The Chikorita just stared into the distance, completely ignoring my question directed at her. I didn't know what she was staring at, exactly, the only thing I could see was the denser part of the forest in the distance and the gravel-like pavement before me, abruptly stopping somewhere between one hundred or two hundred meters from us, to my surprise. It looked like it was exactly stopping where the forest began to grow more dense.

"Uh oh..." Came from Kori, who was a bit hesitant from continuing any further. It seemed as if she knew what was waiting for us.

"Hey, what's wrong? Why did you stop?" I repeated while I made my way back to Kori, wondering why she wasn't walking anymore.

"It seems we have quite the obstacle in our way."

"Hm?" I faced the same direction where we used to walk until a couple of seconds ago again, maybe now noticing why she halted her pace. When I found nothing interesting again, I turned back to Kori. "Come on, tell me. Don't leave me out in the open like this."

Kori looked at him with a tiny bit of determination on her face. Not wanting him to not know what she was thinking, she told him what was going on.

"Some distance away from us is a Mystery Dungeon."

"Explanations, please. You know I know nothing of this world." I just stoically looked at her, as if that would be the most redundant reason to make such a fuzz out of this situation.

"Oh, yeah. Sorry." She immediately replied, snapping out of her petrified stare into the distance and turned to me. "Do you see where the path ends?"

"...Yeah, I do."

"That's a pretty clear sign of a Mystery Dungeon being there. Normally you wouldn't notice them until it's too late, but this here is a lucky exception."

"Interesting. But what exactly are those? Is it that forest?"

"...Not really, sometimes it's a cave, other times it's a mountain, just to name a few. So, explanations, where do I begin... hmm."

Once she had thought for a moment, she began to talk.

"So, first of all," she began to explain, while occasionally glancing at the path in front of her, "the most important thing about Mystery Dungeons is that no matter how many times you visit the same one, it's always a different pattern for how the dungeon's, let's say 'floors', are laid out.

"For the sake of simplicity, let's imagine this scenario: you go into one of them, not knowing this bit of information, and you find a path that branches into two directions. Say you choose the left path, and luckily for you, it leads you to the exit—the next time you enter the same dungeon, there's no guarantee that the left path will lead you to the exit again—or that the branching path will be there at all. No two visits are the same. It means that making maps of the layout of the dungeon's 'floors' is impossible.

"I know that sounds illogical, but that's how they are. Hence the name 'Mystery' Dungeon."

That really sounded like it was a made up thing, but she looked like she was serious about those Mystery Dungeons. But... how did they end up like that, though? How could they shift their floors like that, creating entirely new passages in them, while the environment wasn't being damaged at all? Or was there some damage done, but just not visible... underneath them, maybe?

 _Well, looks like I'll have to see it with my own eyes to believe it. They are kinda interesting, and at the same time scary, to be honest, how they defy the laws of... like, everything. Don't they create earthquakes nearby while they change? They should, shouldn't they?_

"Yeah," I answered, interested in those dungeons and partially saying my thoughts out loud, "that's definitely interesting, and at the same time scary."

"Well, at least they don't spread." She looked at the dungeon again.

"Oh my, that would be horrifying. To witness a town getting sucked into one of these, I mean." I nodded to show my approval of her fear.

She also nodded at my horror of seeing one's hometown being part of a Mystery Dungeon, clearly happy that this would never happen.

"So, are you ready to continue our way to Muji Village?"

"Yes, of course! I'm more than excited to go through the Mystery Dungeon."

Once we finished this conversation, we resumed our journey to the nearest village. Remembering what I actually had wanted to ask Kori, I now had the chance.

She told me that I was an electric type Pokémon, and she herself was a grass type. She continued to explain what those types meant, saying they represented the powers of the individual Pokémon and what they could do with their respective element. Kori was able to throw razor sharp leaves from her giant leaf on her head for example—I realized how it replaced the part of the leaf from where the dangerous ones came from, but I didn't press it any further—that they could get stuck in trees.

 _Wow, those are really dangerous. One false angle or gust of wind and someone will get seriously injured._

Along with that, she also could throw some seeds that grew two little, green leaves out of them. She explained to him that when these seeds hit another Pokémon, they latch onto it and suck out their energy and transfer it into the body of the thrower.

 _Wow, that's kind of morbid... sucking out the life force of another one of their kinds. That's just straight out of a sci-fi horror movie._

Before she could continue her show and tell, I interrupted her with something that's been nagging me after she showed me her first ability.

"Hold on, wait. What the hell are those for?" I practically almost yelled in shock, realizing she has some sort of an extraterrestrial way of draining one's energy with only some seeds, "I can understand the leaves, they can be practical on some occasions, I guess. But where would you see these seeds as useful? That's just for torturing someone."

She just quizzically stared at me, not really knowing what I meant with this interception of her showings. It was as if that would be the most trivial thing she always does when she wants to.

"What are you-… ooh, that's right, I totally forgot..." She said, beginning to understand what I was trying to say, it definitely sounded like she just mentally facepalmed herself. The next part was her just mumbling more to herself than to me. "You aren't from here, right..."

After her apology and brief explanation of her lethal ways of showing me what she could do as a Pokémon (if I decided to get on her nerves a little too much), she continued her show. It was pretty clear why she would be able to do all that, after telling me that not all Pokémon were as tame and talkative as she was. I realized it was just like in my world, the only difference was in the number of species here which were able to verbally communicate with each other.

 _It's just like survival of the fittest here._

The seeds weren't permanent, to my relief. She added that: when the victim faints; when it's no longer able to battle, the leaves decay, and are no longer stealing the energy out of it. The same will happen with the thrower itself, when it is no longer able to battle, the leaves decay, too.

While she was showing me her other attacks, I was in my own thoughts again.

 _So... she's a grass type Pokémon, which can basically manipulate their own body parts—for her it's her giant leaf—to shoot razor sharp pieces of leaves and instantly regrowing the missing parts of its origin. So, does it mean that when she said that I was an electric type Pokémon, I can just control... electricity? Just like that, manipulate it from the atmosphere around me, or something, and channeling it? Or do I generate my own electricity even, that I can use for myself for whenever I should need it? No, that just sounds dumb with the generating thing, every living creature would die if too much current is flowing through their body, so why shouldn't it be the same for me?_

 _Also, that huge amount of pain just before I woke up, that couldn't have been her. She only could manipulate her own element, and not the one from others. So then where did it came from, exactly? From my own body, discharging from its own generated electricity, for whatever reason? Or was it just... something entirely else, just so that I could wake up? If that's what happened, what caused it?_

Lastly, she showed her two vines to him, which brought me out of my monologue, her telling me she could use them as makeshift arms for holding stuff and whatnot, and for attacking. They were used like whips, making that sharp snapping sound every time she whipped the air.

 _Oh my- Those are vines. Not tentacles. I could facepalm myself for my stupidity right now._

I asked Kori if she knew what my own attacks were, trying to distract myself from my thoughts. She answered that I had to discover it myself, I would know best what types of attacks I was able to do.

"But what do I have to do to... trigger it?"

"Just... concentrate on your inner electricity inside of you and try to let some of it escape, I guess? I dunno, that's what I do with my attacks, and after a while it just goes subconsciously; I don't know how to explain it better, sorry. It could be something entirely different for your species. We'll have to ask some other electric type Pokémon, they should know best.

"But when the concentration method fails, just remember that you have your claws and teeth, too. If you somehow get into a situation where you can't attack with your electricity for whatever reason, use those. They are like your backup plan. But for now, try to let some of your electricity flow through you."

So I could generate my own electricity, she claimed. That didn't make any sense, but I rolled with it for now.

"Alright, I'll try. Here goes nothing."

We halted again for my trial and errors in trying to control my type of element. I didn't know what I exactly was supposed to focus on, or what to search for, but I tried everything that would seem plausible for me.

 _So, if I would be the electric energy, where would I be... "stored"? Where would it make the most sense?_

I first searched at the front part of my chest, but only found my usual inner organs, keeping me alive (on second thought, this would've been the worst possible place for it). Next was the back part of my body, where the belly was, there was also neither anything noteworthy, nor feeling anything like an electric storage. Remembering that there was something at the end of my tail, I tried it there, but wasn't able to locate it either, even with my utmost focusing. All of my efforts were futile.

"Ah, I can't find anything...", I eventually sighed, giving up on my quest to find my elemental energy. "I've concentrated on everything I can think of, but I don't seem to find it..."

"Oh, really? Sorry that I couldn't help very much. It seems you have to rely on your physical abilities for now."

* * *

Finally arriving at the sudden end of the gravel path, Kori asked me one more time if I was truly ready to enter the Mystery Dungeon. I nodded, of course. I was really eager to see the inside of one of those, after Kori had told me about them. The feature I wanted to see the most was the shifting of their interior floors.

Before we entered it, however, I had one last question to ask to my guide.

"Kori." I turned my view to her, accomplishing her attention.

"Hm?" She looked back at me.

"How big is this dungeon, just asking."

"Oh, uhh... I have actually no idea, three or four floors, maybe." I didn't know how she thought of the next thing, but she was attempting to make a joke, I presume. "Well, sections, to be exact. Forests have no 'floors'." She snickered at the thought of forests having multiple levels, I meanwhile smirking after hearing that. "That would look really stupid. But, we have wasted more than enough time chit-chatting, let's enter the Dungeon already."

She was right about both things.

"Yeah." I nodded in approval. "Let's go."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: To all of my -8.712 followers, I just want to tell you that updates won't happen for a while. I hope you understand. This A/N will be deleted when updates are more frequently.**

* * *

 **Chapter 3 – Exploration**

 **Sudowoods S1**

The moment we stepped onto earth's ground, the air around us shifted dramatically. It felt much thicker for me somehow, as if we just entered another dimension parallel to ours, while these were connected and accessed via those Mystery Dungeons. It was like the air itself was being artificially created just for those who are in said dungeons. Kori told me nobody knows anything about them, and now I could see why. It was the strangest feeling I had ever experienced; after the fact that I was some kind of electrical cat now.

Out of curiosity I turned myself around to look at the gravel pavement we had been traveling on for the last thirty minutes, only to stare at a wall of trees blocking the entrance. I jumped in surprise, not expecting this at all. These trees were just like a solid wall; they were growing together in themselves in some parts, just to make sure that no one was ever permitted to leave through those outer trees and escape the dungeon prematurely. I even noticed something odd about them: they all look the same! The trees appeared strangely homogenized, as if they had been copied and pasted to the one next to it.

The top of the forest was no different. Its dense vegetation of thick branches and leaves left barely enough room for the sun's light to hit the ground, but still enough to see one's surroundings. The branches seemed to grow infinitely long, sometimes growing through some of the higher tree's trunks. If I had tried to follow one thicker branch above us with my eyes for a while, I would've surely ended up on the same spot I had begun.

After finishing my observation of the barrier and the roof, I turned back to Kori and wanted to voice my thoughts to her. But she was quicker.

"Pretty spooky, huh?" I found her staring at the massive wall behind me, not a single bit of dread visible neither in her voice nor on her face. It looks like she must have travelled through many of those dungeons before, all well known to result similar ways in managing to trap those who dared to enter it. "The way it just throws you somewhere random without you noticing it. As if the laws of time and space are thrown together and mushed into a puddle of an unrecognizable mess."

I nodded in response. The area we had found ourselves in looked like a room, with two sides having some sort of corridor to go through. I'm not sure why, but the grass seemed to have been growing much higher than next to the path we traversed. Kori signaled a bit urgently that we should go. I followed after her, while we went through some sort of corridor which had barely enough room for us to walk next to each other. I was picking the option to walk behind her. I assumed those halls connected the various rooms together, because not long after traversing through the makeshift hallway, we entered another bigger opening.

On the opposite side of the room, inside of a thicker part of grass laid something I've never seen before. It looked like a berry, but not with the usual colors or size I thought berries had. Its round form was acceptable for me, but the blue color it had indicated it was not ripe at all. It even had, from this distance barely visible, black dots on it. But on the other hand, it was way bigger than I thought they could normally get after they were ready to be harvested. But where did it came from, exactly? There were no signs of some berry tree or bush nearby.

 _But god knows how long it has been there for. Maybe it was the Mystery Dungeon that had brought it here, somehow?_

Curious, I asked my guide about it.

"Hey, Kori. Do you know what kind of berry that is?"

"Huh?" She turned to me. After scanning the room again, she still hasn't found it. "Where is it?"

"There." One of the tiny fingers of my paw pointed at the berry, the claw of the same part was extending from inside. I looked at it subconsciously, trying to withdraw it and extend it again, not noticing I was dimming out everything around me.

"Really? I don't see anything." Kori said while she was making her way to the spot which I had indicated. Halfway there, she saw the item, too. "Ooh, there's an Oran berry hidden in a patch of grass! Nice catch."

For me my paws were much more interesting—I didn't notice her coming back from the found object. I was still glancing at my outstretched leg, before I answered to the compliment, a bit flattered. "Oh, t-thanks, I guess." It felt like my cheeks went from blue to a shade of red. "Glad I could be of help for you. What kind of berry is this, though? I've never seen it before."

She had grabbed the berry with one of her vines, it was wrapped around the berry once. Her vine made its way to me, holding the berry in front of me to look at it better.

"No surprise there, I think. It's an Oran berry, which has the awesome ability to make you recover much faster after a big fight or training. Plus it tastes sooo good. Its skin is hard to crack, but once you manage to open it, the juice from the inside will do its work. It's without a single doubt the most common and loved berry for us Pokémon."

"Interesting to hear. Thanks for telling me." _Not at all exaggerating with this._

We were going along the only other hallway connected with the room (which was to the right where we entered), when I quickly noticed something. Kori was still holding the berry with her vine; it was retracted to the length where it almost looked like a human finger growing out of her neck.

Wait. Why did I only now realize that she wasn't wearing anything? It didn't even cross my mind to register her as someone with nothing to hide from her. Not even myself had I seen as someone who was naked. I was theorizing it was the fur that hid this from me, I was almost certain this was the reason. Strangely enough, it didn't and still doesn't feel weird to me to not have anything on me except my skin and blue fur; black-blue, to be exact.

I don't think Pokémon even wear something along those lines. I thought of some kind of bag, those which you can hang around your neck or put it on your back to carry stuff. Was that even a thing here? She looked like that kind of Pokémon which hobby was mostly traveling around the continent, with her knowledge of these Dungeons we were currently in and all that. She must have seen plenty of those to know these things about them.

"Hey," I tried to grab her attention while entering another somewhat bigger room than before, which was empty once I looked around for a moment. "You're a wanderer of some sorts, right?"

"Yeah, I am. I think I even told you that, why do you ask?" She faced me and looked at me with her big eyes.

"Because, uh... don't you have some sort of bag or something to store your berries in? Or do you hold everything together with your vines?"

She suddenly looked down and sighed, as if she is being remembered of something that could have been averted. Or was embarrassing for her to admit. I wasn't sure.

"Umm, about that..." She held one paw behind her neck, to symbolize her being unsure in telling me about something. I was surprised at how flexible she was with her front legs, her body structure not implying her to be so agile as I thought it to be. "I did have a bag full of food and water and other similar important stuff, but... oh, that's embarrassing... I lost it."

"You... huh? Lost it?"

"Well, I didn't technically lose it, but some wild Pokémon snagged it before I noticed it." She sighs and continues. "I think it was some Mankey, but I'm not certain about that. I only saw the absence of my bag after I decided to continue. That's what I get for letting my guard down for a couple seconds, I guess..."

 _Mankey? Hmm, I can kinda guess how it could look like, but I think now is not the best time to ask for details. That can wait, for sure._

She sighed again and closed her eyes for a moment. "That's one reason I want to hastily arrive at Muji Village, I haven't eaten anything since last evening. And yes, I searched for something edible, trust me. Everywhere. Not a single apple or berry tree was in sight. My luck in a nutshell, I guess. I'm barely managing to not eat this berry out of hunger, even. Being in one of these dungeons doesn't help much, either... I seriously hope we find anything to eat in here. Please tell me if you see anything edible, alright?"

Was she serious about that? Couldn't she just eat some leaves, or grass, or anything plant-like, for that matter? Who knew how long this berry had been laying there, it could have been days, even. Normally berries should wilt after an hour or two. The fact that Kori informed me that it has a hard skin shouldn't matter that much, it's still a fruit. Whatever the case, it shouldn't be edible in the first place.

Or I'm again rambling too much to myself, and shouldn't have been worried about that in the first place. Kori was acquainted with what she was doing, right? I should be trusting her decisions.

…I didn't have much of a choice, now did I?

I didn't even know what to answer to her little rant. After simply nodding and answered that I would tell her immediately to verify I had been listening, we continued on our way again. Or so we would have.

"Looks like we hit a dead end." I stated the obvious.

"No, really?" She jokingly replied as we turned around to take the other way.

Before we could walk back the way we came from, something stood in our way. Due to mysterious reasons, a small tree with yellow spots on its trunk just popped into existence and was standing before us. Not really knowing the existence of said blockage, I nearly walked right into it. I took two steps back, slowly realizing my reaction time had also been improved by a lot. Which makes a lot of sense to me, now that I was some sort of animal.

 _Woah, where did that came from? Is that the dungeon's making? I should really start expecting the impossible in here, after Kori's information about those places and my small look-around back at the entrance._

While I was wondering why the tree was blocking us and how we were gonna go around it, Kori already had her other vine out and a stern expression on her face.

"Careful, Xunie. That Sudowoodo surprised you pretty well, didn't it?"

 _Sudowoodo? Does she mean that tree? That's a strange name for a-_

Suddenly, the seemingly lifeless tree moved on its own. Its two branches with their three small bushes, which almost looked like arms and hands, snapped out of their petrified state and started to shift their position from an upward angle to a downward angle. The strangest part was that it just grew a set of eyes which were locked right onto me and a long mouth beneath them. Its roots were replaced with a pair of legs, it now standing with those.

I couldn't believe my eyes; for a second I was considering the thought that I was hallucinating this time for real, but after a quick glance at the walking trunk before us, with the fact what had happened to me just half an hour ago, one thing made itself clear in my head.

 _THAT THING IS ALIVE?!_

I hastily took another two steps back, while staring at the intimidating tree. The fact that this thing was towering over me with over four times my body height didn't help me keep my dread at a manageable level at all. Its intention was clear as glass to me after it vocalized its battle cry.

*Rrrraaaaahhh!*

I practically froze in shock, my muscles paralyzed and my fur stood on end. This almost felt like it did while I was in that unconscious state, floating in nothingness. I managed to close my eyes and was waiting for the inevitable impact.

*Snap!*

A strong sound of a whip cracking went through the air.

* _Aaaaghhh…_ *

 _*Thud..._ *

Kori's vine connected sharply with the lower part of the Sudowoodo's body, leaving a deep dent in said place. Little pieces of brown pellets were falling to the ground. The attacker crashed onto the grassy earth next to the entryway; it wasn't moving anymore.

After slowly opening my eyes again, I was met with a different scene from what I had anticipated. Lying next to the entrance of the hallway, the walking trunk, with a lethal dent in his body. Strangely, no sounds or movements were coming from it after the brute force of her attack. Kori knocked it out with a single hit. _How strong is she?_ By the looks of it, her weak looking vine just smashed against a rock and it exploded into a thousand little pieces.

Kori was retreating her second vine back into her neck and looked at me disapprovingly. Her facial expression told me everything I needed to understand what she was thinking of right now.

She saved my sorry ass.

"I-I... uh..." I started stuttering, and just now noticed I was holding my breath the entire time. I I was not sure if I could find anything reasonable to say to her after my second rescue on the same day, but I tried anyway. "Listen, I-"

"No, you know what," she interrupted me, holding one of her legs up and shaking her head, the leaf swinging alongside her movement. I was fearing what would have awaited me afterwards. But I was surprised yet again, "don't worry about it. It was my fault you weren't prepared for this, you wouldn't have been able to do anything against it, anyway. Come on, let's get going."

She wanted to go back the way we came from, but thanks to her vague answers I wanted her to elaborate some more.

"Uh... what do you mean by, 'not prepared for this?'" I hoped that didn't go too much in the direction of 'annoyed questioning'. The last thing I wanted to start was a stupid argument about something trivial to her, but not so much to me.

"I don't know why, but I forgot to tell you that Pokémon live in these Mystery Dungeons. Due to unknown circumstances, these Pokémon are much more hostile and territorial than any other you will meet. Normal wilds are scared of the civilized and won't show themselves most of the time, until you purposefully try to intrude into their home, of course. And for the second one, I'll explain that later in detail." Came from her.

I nodded _. Is that the reason I didn't even see any other creature on our way here? Well, except for the occasional flying ones, which were much too high to properly inspect their figure. I hope you won't forget the detailed explanation, Kori._

It appeared the Sudowoodo was unconscious, or at least it hadn't moved any since its unfaithful encounter with Kori's vine. Interested, I examined the Pokémon a bit closer, whilst still holding my safe distance to it. The first thing I noticed was the body of this thing wasn't made out of real wood, it looked too smooth to be any kind of bark. The small bushes at the tip of its two arm-like branches weren't exactly little bundles of leaves, either. Those, too, were much too flat to have anything related to leaves to be made out of them. The little brown pebbles next to it didn't help me much to determine what exact element this creature was.

 _I'm confused. Is this Pokémon a living tree or something along the lines of a walking stone creature, disguised as a tree? This world is so strange._

Seeing Kori idling at the entryway of the hall, waiting for me to follow her, I eventually answered her offer and made my way to her.

* * *

 **Sudowoods S2**

It turned out the true way forward was the room next to our original entrance. We found some sort of round tunnel in said room, which was just a hole in the never ending wall of tree trunks. It was smaller than the monotone corridors we had been traversing through and it was much thicker vegetated than them. It was badly hidden, too. We quickly discovered it behind some overgrown grass.

I was lucky to not have met any more of those fake tree Pokémon on our way back, and I was happy about that. No interesting topic usable for conversation was available, mainly because I don't know what to ask her first. And she said when we are out of this dungeon, she would have more than enough time to explain more stuff to me. For now we had to keep our guard up for any other aggressive Pokémon we might run into. Kori said we should be careful, even when the inhabitants of the Dungeon were weak.

 _My god, I'm such a coward. The fact I was turned into a Pokémon, which definitely have some kinds of animalistic instincts for various occasions and encounters with other Pokémon, makes it even worse. I'm pretty sure I didn't have any of those when I was a human, they weren't necessary for our survival anymore, with the technological advancements and whatnot. But here? Do I even have any trace of animal instinct in me? Except cowering in fear, it seems I'm not missing that. How do I even find the other ones out...?_

"My Arceus, isn't there anything I could eat in here? When you need something to eat the most, you never find anything.." She mumbled to herself, her hunger getting slowly worse.

 _Arceus, huh? Didn't she say that after she found me?_

"Who is Arceus?" My ears perked up a bit after she gasped.

"You..." she wanted to say something, but remembered my predicament I found myself in not long ago and replaced her initial speech, "Arceus is our creator."

"...you mean he created you?"

"No, silly. Us, all of Pokékind. He was the very first Pokémon to ever exist. Some even call him The Creator, instead of Arceus. I can tell you about him later, if you want."

" _Us all?" You mean you all. If he was really the first one in existence and had the power to create those Pokémon creatures, then he might can turn me back into a human! I just have to find him and ask if he could turn me back. He also would be the source of reliable answers I can get out of my situation here, and can explain why I got this stupid amnesia. How hard could finding him be? ...That is, if he is even real._

"Yeah, better tell me later."

"Alright."

Her stomach protested to her after our little conversation just now, and again I just had to ask her something which might or might not be trivial to her.

"Kori, can't you eat leaves, or grass, or something? I would say yo-"

"What?" she snapped her head in my direction and almost yelled, resulting in me recoiling back. She noticed it quickly, and apologized immediately. "Oh my… sorry about that... It's just... uh..." It was obvious she was struggling to find the fitting words to explain her little outrage, clearly embarrassed about it, too.

"You don't want to eat plants, because you are partly one, right?"

"N-no, not really..." she denied my theory, "I understand why you asked me that, don't worry. But I'm not a Mareep, or a Flaaffy. Besides, the grass tastes horrible. And if some pieces of dirt are still stuck to it, it's even worse." She outstretched her tongue to further verify her claim.

"Oh, alright. Thanks for clearing that up."

 _I guess with Flaafy and the other one she meant some kind of sheep species. I hope I know what they look like when I see them._

"Wait, you don't even know which Pokémon I mean, right? They are-"

"No, no. It's alright. I can kinda imagine how they would look like."

"...uh, really?"

"Yeah, don't worry."

"Mhmm, ok then, if you say so…" She shrugged.

Concentrating on our way forward, I quickly noticed that we didn't run into any other of those Sudowoodo - that's what Kori was calling them. We didn't find anything particularly interesting in this section of the Dungeon, much to my partner's dismay.

* * *

 **Sudowoods S3**

We were lucky to find the connection to the next section rather quickly, so the encounters with those Pokémon stood as low as possible.

As we entered yet another hallway, I couldn't shake the feeling away that we were being watched. At first I marked it off as just some paranoia from me, but when I heard something rustling behind us I almost jumped.

"W-what was that?" I stuttered, turning around to see what caused this noise.

"Probably another one of those Sudowoodo, but those aren't much a threat to us; you don't have to be so worried. I'll protect you from those monsters." Her tone indicated some slight traces of humor, I presumed she used it to try to make me feel better.

I was unable to locate the source of the noise—to my relief and to my horror—while Kori was already on her way again. I briefly witnessed her turning a corner in the hall. I was yelling for her to wait, me meanwhile running towards said junction. Strangely, I tripped over my own legs, but it felt like something caused me to trip. Or it was because I wasn't yet forced to walk faster than the usual walking speed. It didn't really bother me, but it was enough to increase the distance to my guide. I turned the same direction as Kori did just seconds ago, now with improved caution to my feet.

"Hey, wait for m-"

After I tried to follow my guide, I stopped dead in my tracks. I was expecting my guide standing there, waiting for me to catch up. But instead, something else greeted my vision. A solid, wooden barrier made of tree trunks.

It was a dead end.

 _Wh- huh?_

My eyes ran along the wall blocking my way, my paws were now touching the wall just to be sure. Yes, it was there; I wasn't going crazy yet. Or maybe I was starting to, didn't that wall have an almost unnoticeable darker shade than all the others? No, I was sure it was just the light.

I... couldn't have just hallucinated her going this way, right?

I quickly turned my body in the other direction of the branch, to see an empty corridor full of emptiness.

My seemingly biggest fear I had since we entered this Mystery Dungeon turned into reality. Me, without my guide to help me when I needed her the most; me, in an laws-of-existence defying Dungeon with no certainty of knowing the right path to the exit.

Me, all alone with those aggressive... stone-tree Pokémon, attacking me on sight.

My heart was pumping and a cold shiver ran down my spine.

I didn't know what to do, I didn't know where to go, I didn't know why my guide was gone. But one thing was certain to me.

 _Breath in, calm down... panicking won't help me in the slightest bit here. Breath out. The most important thing right now is that I find Kori._

I wanted to shout her name, to see if she would've been in the nearby area, but quickly went against that idea—this would only attract the wild Pokémon, and that would be the very last thing I wanted to happen. The only option I had was going in the other direction.

Remembering the sudden noise from before, I checked on any kind of suspicious movements or sounds. Finding nothing, I started my quest of finding Kori.

 _This goddamn Dungeon just gets worse and worse. I can't believe I was eager to get into one of these abominations of nature, or whatever they are. I'm just hoping I'm not going too far away from my partner..._

Slowly and steady I made my way through the empty corridor.

 _And those Pokémon who roam in here, which she said I can't do anything against, isn't doing me a favor, too. What should I do when I meet one of them? The only reliable option is to run away, but what if I land in a dead end?_

I entered a small room, which was empty; except for the fact that an item laid just to the right from where I stood.

 _Now what the hell is that blue spherical thing now?_

Its smooth surface seemed almost too even to be held onto. I would've tried it out, but there was just one small problem.

 _How am I even supposed to carry stuff with no proper way of grabbing them?_

Then, it struck me. I could've just rolled it along with me.

 _Oh my god, I'm a genius!_

But when I wanted to lay my paw on it—one for my genius rolling idea, and two because of my curiosity in how the surface of that item felt like—someone, or more like something spoke to me.

 _ **Trawl Orb.**_

"Ah!" I almost screamed after hearing the unknown voice in my head. Quickly shutting my mouth, and with a racing heart, I looked around me to make sure I didn't lure one of the wilds of this area to me. When I heard nothing suspicious, I sighed and tried to calm down.

 _What was that?!_

Still in a little shock from earlier, I decided to touch the blue circular thing again. Maybe this orb was the source of the voice, who knew. I hoped it would be. This world had been very strange the second I was able to see through my eyes.

 _ **Trawl Orb.**_

 _Ah, it's just this orb. Telepathically communicating with me, like it's some sort of psychic. Great._

The voice sounded like it came from everywhere at once, even from inside of me. It also had a very gentle and feminine voice, with traces of robotic sounds to it.

 _What does it even do? Seems-_

 _ **Trawl Orb - Pulls all items on the current floor to the user.**_

 _...Nevermind then._

Continuing my search for both Kori and the exit, I stopped right before the hallway I had the intention of entering. Looking at the orb beside me, something came to my mind. Maybe I could use this to get some help from an item, who knows?

I decided to use the orb.

 _...Uh, how do I activate it?_

Looking around said sphere, I didn't find anything that implied 'I activate this thing'. I pondered for a moment, just what was I supposed to do to use it?

 _Come on, activate, for-_

Suddenly the item was glowing ever so brightly, I had to cover my eyes from it. This lasted for about five seconds, until it stopped doing its thing and just disappeared.

It seemed like nothing happened.

 _...ugh, did it even do what it's supposed to do, or did the Dungeon interfere, with its magical magic? Or are there no items here?_

Something landed on the grass next to me and rolled a little bit in my direction. Its red semi-circular shape instantly told me what it was supposed to be.

An apple. A very fresh one at that.

If Kori were here, she would've mowed it down before it even catched my attention in landing beside me. I just stared at it for a few seconds. The orb seemed to have completed its task, but…

 _Is that all? Just an apple was on this floor? I would've hoped for a more helpful item than just something edible. Oh well, at least Kori has something to eat… when I find her._

 **Meanwhile… Kori's POV**

Her face slammed to the ground.

 _Ow… hey! Where did it go?!_

She could've sworn there was something on the ground just now. Maybe the Chikorita was hallucinating out of hunger? No, she was certain there was something. It was too real to be just be a fatamorgana. But now it was gone.

 _Arceus dammit, I just want something to eat; is that too much to ask?!_

Her stomach sounded like there lived a wild beast in it, growling the whole time. She almost couldn't take it anymore; there **had** to be something edible somewhere.

 _Arg… where did the apple even go?_

 **Back to Xunie's POV**

Instead of the blue orb, I now had to somehow bring the apple with me. Rolling it on the ground, like I used to do with the previous item, was a possibility, but then it would be all dirty and everything. Carrying it with my body was not something I could do, because I didn't want to hobble on only three legs. Maybe if I were more experienced and accustomed to my new body, then this would've been no problem.

I decided to just push it with my paws. The dirt was not really big of a deal, as I've noticed the apple was on grass most of the time, instead of only the ground below.

After a while of walking and pushing, I was so happy of the absence of those wild Pokémon. It was only me and the object next to me. It was so quiet, too, I could almost hear my own heartbeat.

 _It's really peaceful here, when there are no wilds in the area who are out to kill you. Normally this would be very suspicious, but I don't care. The exit's right here, too. I mean, I hope it is._

Before me was the usual smaller, round tunnel, overgrown with the common greens in the area. But now the question was: should I wait here for my partner? Or should I continue to search for her? What if she was already in the next section?

No, I was sure she would've searched for me. Kori was searching for me, right?

 _Of course she is, stop worrying about that. She wouldn't just abandon me because of some stupid dungeon._

I occasionally switched glances at the small tunnel before me, the hallway where I came from and the only other passage, now certain I should just wait for her. She'd come by here eventually, right? The floors before weren't that big, only on the first section did we turn the wrong way, which made it longer than it should've had to be. So why would it be different here? I found the exit rather quickly too (I hoped it was), so Kori couldn't be that far from me. Maybe she even was in the by me unexplored passage right now?

It was then when I looked at my initial passage again, my heart went from 0 to 100 in an instant. The only thing that I absolutely didn't want to see, stood at the entrance of the room which I resided in at the moment. A tree me and my guide met in the first section. The same tree with yellow specks on it was idling not too far away from me, seemingly waiting for the perfect moment to strike. How long had it been waiting there?

I had the brilliant idea of not moving at all. _Maybe_ , I thought, _it can't see me when I don't move._ That was quickly proven wrong, because the tree moved the exact same way as the first one did, before it had tried to attack.

 _Uhm… maybe now would be the best time to make a run for it and pray that I find Kori._

And just like that, I was sprinting into the other passage. Being extra careful to watch out that I, under no circumstances, allowed myself to lose my balance and trip over again. Who knew what this tree monster would be able to do to me.

"Kooriiii!" I screamed like I was followed by a demon from hell, "Where are you?!"

Turning a corner, I noticed the hall before me was unnaturally long, seemingly stretching for several hundred metres. Ignoring this anomaly, I concentrated on getting away from this wild Pokémon. Its footsteps were still reaching my eardrums, and the slight vibration after every step it took were picked up by my paws. My body screamed at me, _faster, faster, go faster_ , but I didn't listen to it. The risk of tripping again was high, even at the speed I had now.

Slowly arriving at the junction, I mentally prepared myself for the turn to the left. The moment I wanted to slow down, my curiosity got the better of me and my vision switched to the Sudowoodo for a short time. That proved not to be a good idea, it was only a couple metres away from me.

Suddenly, it jumped forward and was attempting to hit me with its branched horn—or whatever that was. Just in time, I managed to jump to the left and landed, to my surprise, very gently on the ground. As my legs wanted to carry me forward, away from my aggressor, some peculiar sound entered my ears.

I looked back, and questioned my luck.

The Sudowoodo was stuck with the top of its head in the wall of trees surrounding the Dungeon. It wanted to escape from its situation, but to no avail; the missing parts of the wall, seemed to have regrown again, resulting in the Sudowoodo being completely stuck. The little arms and legs it had didn't help much, either. They were just a little too short to get a good grip somewhere to help itself getting out.

A sigh escaped my lips, partially relieved that I'm not in immediate danger anymore.

"Nice try, next time be more careful where you're running!" I mocked its stuck form, it had given up by now and accepted its fate. Or it was tired out. I didn't know. "Guess Kori was wrong about me not being able to do anything, I just needed a bit of luck."

"Xunie," I jumped, not anticipating someone to call me. For a moment I thought it was the wild Pokémon saying to me, "there you are. I finally found you." but to my relief it was Kori.

"Oh my god, Kori!" I was so delighted, I wanted to tackle her out of sheer happiness. But just before I hit her, she caught me with her vines and turned me around again.

"You can do that later, I just want to get out of this hellhole." She sighed after putting me down again. "Sometimes I just think everything turns against me. This is one of those times. Let's just go."

"O-oh, ok…" I stepped aside and let her lead the way again.

She noticed the Sudowoodo still stuck in the wall, and just stared at it for a moment. It seemed she was pondering over something, a part of her vine was outside; hey, where was the Oran Berry? She didn't have it in her grip anymore. I couldn't blame her for eating it, she was pretty desperate for something edible. But why is she still looking at the-

Suddenly, the familiar sound of a crack made itself known.

Before I noticed what just happened, Kori spoke up.

"Ah. I needed that. Stupid Sudowoodo."

Did she just-

I stared at the wild Pokémon, now split in two halves, unmoving. A shiver ran down my spine, as I realized what she had done.

She just cut that Pokémon straight in half!

"Kori, w-what the fuck did you do? Y-you just- ...killed that thing!"

"And? It was wild, no one would care."

"Wh- but- ..." A mixture of ways to react came to mind, but I was too shocked to let them out.

Eventually, I gave up. I just kept my mouth shut, after all, maybe this was the best option for me in this situation.

I was very certain she was not in the right mood for any sort of topic to talk about, so we were silent the entire way to the tunnel while I kept a safe distance between her, just to make sure. Well, we were quiet, but Kori saw the apple laying next to it.

With lightning speed she went straight for the fruit and already munched on it.

"Mmmh, thith ith thoo good!" She failed to speak with her mouth full.

Not even five seconds later, the apple was gone. The Chikorita was much happier, now that she had gotten something to eat. The satisfaction surging through her body, and at the same time quenching her inner monster—her belly.

"Finally." She sat down, closed her eyes for a moment, and relished her few seconds of satisfaction of not starving anymore. After a deep sigh, she motioned me to go through the tunnel with her.

* * *

 **Route 27**

Yes, I was right, this was the way out of the Dungeon. Relieve came over me as I felt the light breeze around my body and breathed in the much fresher air again, along with various scents from the trees and flowers next to us.

In the distance I saw a small mountain range near the horizon. They weren't high enough to have a snowy top, but instead had an immense amount of colorful flowers on them. Before us, the gravel path. It was continuing like normal, as if it never had disappeared in the first place. Surrounding our group and the pathway were still trees, but the amount of them has decreased tremendously after exiting the Dungeon. The green color of the leaves indicated the season of summer—at least, I thought it was. This wasn't my home planet, after all. Through the scattered trees I spotted the beautiful sunset and the view of the now partially orange sky. It was magnificent, as if it had been ripped straight out of a fairytale.

Why did I not notice all that before? Was I really just focused on the way ahead of me, to not have the slightest intention of taking in the local nature? Even for making sure that I knew what was around me, there could've been a town several metres from the place I woke up and I wouldn't have noticed.

"Wow," was the only thing I could muster up.

While I stood there and awed the sunset, the first owl-like Pokémon were starting their nightly routine. I spotted some small rodent Pokémon running around the grass, too—they even jumped over the gravel sometimes, as if it was an obstacle they had to overcome to reach their destination.

"Beautiful, isn't it? That's one of the positives of travelling everywhere, you get to see breathtaking views and sceneries like this," Kori remarked. "It's getting late, so we should get going… or, wait."

She was switching glances at the way forward and the sunset, careful enough to not get blinded by the sun. "You know what, we won't make it before it gets really dark, so we should find a place where we can sleep for the night."

"Sleeping… here, outside? Without anything above us? Are you sure this is a good idea?" I was not really fond of getting wet, maybe a sudden rainfall would happen while we were slumbering.

 _Or, I'm again making it look worse than it is. I'm not a human anymore, so I would be able to withstand the forces of nature more easily, with all this fur to keep me warm._

"Come on, you're making it worse than it actually is. I think I found us a nice place where we can rest. Trust me, you'll like it." Came from her as she was looking at a particular tree.

...As if she could read my mind.

* * *

 _So… this is how they sleep, huh?_

Tired as I was, I accepted the suggestion from Kori that we should call it a day and find a place for the night, after everything that happened today—even if it just was a trip through a relatively small Dungeon. I was exhausted, and I guessed my guide was, too.

We, or rather, Kori, found a nice place under a treetop, its size was good enough to suit as a temporary shield from the rain for us both. She wanted to make sure, she told me, as I watched the sky for any sign of bad weather, finding none for now.

By the time we found our sleeping place, the sun already had set behind the horizon, making more than enough space for the moon to shine; it was almost a full moon. The stars were dispersed all across the now blackish blue sky, most of them shining ever so brightly, others were just beginning to.

Now, there I laid. In another world, in a different body, with a stranger who was lucky enough to randomly find me, unconscious. No, what was I thinking, _I_ was the one who luckily got found. My mind was already often coming up with what-if situations, but I tried not to directly focus on them.

While Kori was already in her position and ready for sleep to take her, I was still trying to find a comfortable position for me to slumber. Not wanting to disturb her, my body very quietly shifted around, until it finally got into an acceptable sleeping posture. My ears, as I had noticed, were just big enough for my head—I was able to put it on them and not let my cheeks touch the ground. They were cushy, and didn't protest against my head laying on top of them, too, so it was a win-win situation for me.

I was thinking, _wouldn't it be cold outside at night, especially with the wind around us?_ Actually, no, not at all. I felt it blowing against me and my fur, but the feeling of getting cold was nonexistent. It was fair to say that sleeping in the open like this was pretty relaxing.

While getting accustomed to the smell of grass in front of me, Kori spoke up.

"Hey, you asleep yet, Xunie?"

My head perked up and looked in her direction. She was doing the same, but with her legs under her head on the ground, and her leaf over her body to act as a blanket—she looked kinda cute doing that, I didn't know why that was. It seemed as if at any moment she would fall asleep.

"Do I look like I'm sleeping? ...What is it, Kori?"

"Remember when we met the first Sudowoodo? You wanted to know why I said that you wouldn't be able to do anything against them, and now is the perfect time for that, don't you say?" She said, now looking at the ground, "...speaking of those, we only met two of them; that's very odd. Normally there would've been at least six or seven in there… anyway, do you want me to tell you?"

Oh. Now it was me who forgot. _Two of them were more than enough for me, why do I have so much luck?_

"Riiight, I remember now, yeah. Tell me, I'm interested."

"So, you know we Pokémon have various types of elements, I told you that before. Those Sudowoodo have the stone type, even when many say they have the plant type, like me. Don't believe them, they are made of stone." As she began with her explanation, it seemed she wanted to go in every little detail with it. "And you weren't able to show me that you can fight with, or control your electricity, leaving you with only your teeth and claws. If you were to fight with your claws, this would've been a normal type attack.

"Unlucky for you—and every normal type—you would've done next to nothing. Just… imagine you wanted to carve something in stone with only your claws. That won't work, obviously. You'll get more hurt than you do harm, you know what I mean?"

I nodded. This went on for a while, she was mentioning something along the lines of there being 18 different types, all with their advantages and disadvantages against other ones. All that stuff should've been as trivial as anything for me to stay alive in this world. But for now I knew that I should be the most careful when meeting an aggressive ground type. They can really hurt and have strong attacks sometimes, she said.

"You're lucky you don't have to be cautious about five different types. Grass is the most vulnerable out of all of them." Kori finished with her one-time use of an explanation. "That doesn't mean that we are weak, though," she added with a quick wink.

 _I saw that you were not a pushover, but me… I have to get myself together. And next time we meet someone who wants to attack us, I promise to be more useful than I was back in the Dungeon. But…_

"How can I know which Pokémon are ground?"

"Trust me when I say that you'll definitely feel it when you meet one."

"What do you mean by 'feel it?'"

She snickered for a second. "Your instinct will tell you, what else?"

 _...oh. I might have a problem there. Might. Still not sure if I have these or not. Well, until I meet any ground type, there's no real way to test it._

A long yawn was heard from me, Kori following right after. _Woah, I didn't know I could open my mouth this much. If I had known that earlier in the Dungeon, I would've carried that apple with my teeth instead of rolling it on the ground._

"Don't infect me with your yawning!" Came from her, clearly meant to not be taken seriously.

"Haha. Very funny. Shouldn't we be asleep by now?"

"No rush, we have all the time in the world. Well, maybe. You're pretty hungry I presume?"

Suddenly the feeling of an empty stomach revealed itself, making growling noises. Yep, I was.

"Maybe you can eat some grass now, Xunie," she laughed. "No, but seriously: we will be continuing at dawn, alright? That way we can arrive at the village and still get some late breakfast."

"Sounds good. I'm pretty worn out myself."

"Heh, you know that you didn't really travel that far yet, right? Don't worry, that's the Dungeon's fault. It somehow accelerates your body's internal functions, meaning you'll get hungry much more quickly. On the other paw it can help you regenerate faster, if you get hurt. So I guess it's made up for?"

"I… guess? But, I'm gonna sleep now. Good night, Kori."

"Yeah. See you tomorrow."

I turned my head around and laid down on my ear again. After a quick search for a good spot, I closed my eyes, letting me take myself to dreamland.

* * *

 _ **Their journey to the village, they say.**_

 _ **A big surprise there, if you may.**_

 _ **Be quick, before they wake,**_

 _ **or our plan will be at stake.**_


End file.
